


The Color Of Blood

by MonsieurBlueSky (MyChemicalRachel)



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff, M/M, Soulmates, you see color when you meet your soulmate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:40:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 8,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24208363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyChemicalRachel/pseuds/MonsieurBlueSky
Summary: There was so much that science couldn’t explain-- no one knew how Matches were chosen. It was just some innate thing that everyone was born with. Some people developed the ability to see color while others never did. All that was truly known was that it created some kind of special bond between the people it affected. Romantic, sexual, platonic… the bonds were limitless. In Bucky’s case, the bond with Steve was nothing short of complex.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 8
Kudos: 149





	1. Part One; Color

The first color Bucky ever saw was blood.

It didn’t have a name then, not that he knew anyway, but he knew instantly it was different.

From childhood, they tell stories-- fact and fairy tale-- about what happens when you meet your Match. Teachers drone on about the science of it; something about how seeing a certain person for the first time triggers part of the occipital lobe of the brain, allowing color to be perceived where it wasn’t able to be before. Parents tell stories about soulmates; eyes meeting across the room, love at first sight, literally blooming with color.

Bucky always thought it was kind of stupid, until he saw the blood.

It was smeared across a smaller boy’s cheek, his knuckles, his shirt. And in that instant it was all Bucky could see.

It took him only a few seconds to put together exactly what was happening-- this small, bloody boy with his fists raised, and a bigger kid who looked murderous. Not much of a choice, Bucky decided, and then pounced onto the kid who was almost twice the size of him. When the bigger kid realized what was happening, he took off, not wanting much of a fight after all.

When he turned back to the small boy, he was frowning at Bucky. “I could have handled it on my own.” His voice wobbled and so did his wrists. He looked fragile, like a strong breeze could knock him down.

But Bucky smiled at him. “I know. I’m Bucky.”

The boy finally dropped his fists, appraising Bucky with his bright eyes-- another nameless color Bucky had never seen before. He must have deemed Bucky as a non-threat because he stuck out his little hand and said, “I’m Steve Rogers.”

They didn’t talk about the color for a long time, though Bucky knew Steve must have seen it, too. It was a lot to wrap his head around after the initial shock of seeing the blood. Bucky wasn’t stupid. He knew what the colors were supposed to mean. He just wasn’t sure what they meant for him and Steve.

There was so much that science couldn’t explain-- no one knew how Matches were chosen. It was just some innate thing that everyone was born with. Some people developed the ability to see color while others never did. All that was truly known was that it created some kind of special bond between the people it affected. Romantic, sexual, platonic… the bonds were limitless. In Bucky’s case, the bond with Steve was nothing short of complex.

It didn’t take long for Bucky to fall completely in love with Steve. But loving Steve Rogers, Bucky grew to realize, was not an easy thing.

As they grew older, Bucky hit growth spurts and puberty and Steve… didn’t. He stayed small. One doctor said that his small stature was what caused his myriad of health problems, while another doctor said it was his health that kept him small. Whatever the cause and effect, it didn’t change that Steve was a spitfire; regardless of his size, Steve was made up of all heart and stupidity. He liked to pick fights, for reasons Bucky could not fathom, and refused to run away when the fight got too big for him to handle.

That’s where Bucky stepped in. He knew Steve could carry his own, but sometimes Bucky just wanted to carry him instead.

It was in the winter of 1933, as Steve battled another bout of pneumonia, when they first spoke of the colors. Bucky sat next to a bedridden Steve-- he didn’t like to call it babysitting, but someone had to make sure Steve didn’t die while his mother was away at work--when Steve woke up in a coughing fit.

By then, it was pretty much routine to help Steve into a sitting position, hold the cup to his lips for him to drink. They’d been through this so many times before, but it felt different when they locked eyes over the brim of the mug. Bucky lowered the cup, setting it back on the nightstand. He tossed a crooked smile in Steve’s direction, though it hurt his face to do so. He didn’t feel like smiling.

He was so pale, seeming to disappear into the white sheets. Cheeks hollow, collar bones sticking out of the stretched neck of the oversized T-shirt. He was still the most beautiful creature Bucky had ever laid eyes on.

They sat there, watching each other, for an indefinite amount of time. Hours could have passed, or seconds, or years. Steve’s eyes were easy to get lost in.

Slowly, Steve lifted a hand to point a fragile finger at Bucky’s face. “Blue,” he said.

And the word, it sounded short and simple, but as Bucky repeated it back, it tasted foreign on his tongue. Something scratched at the back of his mind, but he couldn’t place where he’d heard it before. “What does that mean?”

“Your eyes,” Steve said. He dropped his hand, falling back against the pillows, and let an easy smile stretch across his chapped lips. “Your eyes are blue.”

Bucky jolted as if shocked. That’s where he’s heard that word before; blue is a color.

“They have classes down at the rec center,” Steve said, not acknowledging Bucky’s shock in the slightest. “They’re for pairs only, so I hid behind the bleachers to listen--” He paused here to cough some more, shaking his head when Bucky offered him water. With a soft sigh, he said, “They teach all about colors. They have different names. And there’s so many of them. Blue is my favorite. Just like your eyes.”

A lump settled in Bucky’s throat and he cleared it a couple of times. He can’t seem to look directly at Steve. He knew he needed to say something, but his heart felt like it was beating too fast, too slow, stopping and restarting instantaneously.

A small wheeze escaped Steve, not sounding like the laugh it was intended to be. “Geez, Buck. I’m kind of pouring my heart out over here. You should say something.”

Bucky’s mouth felt dry. “What do you want me to say?”

“Say that you see it, too.” Steve’s voice sounded smaller than normal, but when Bucky cast a glance at him, his expression was steady, intent and focused. “Say that I’m not crazy. Say you can feel it, like I can.”

Bucky thought back to the moment he first saw Steve, the color that overwhelmed him, but more than that, the feeling. The warmth that rushed through his veins when he saw the scrawny kid with blood smeared on his face. He felt it presently, too, that warmth, and realized it’s the feeling he always gets when he looks at Steve. 

“What is blood?” Bucky asked quietly. “It has a name, right? The color of blood?”

“Red,” Steve said too quickly-- Bucky almost rolled his eyes. Steve had seen a lot of blood in his fifteen years of life, mostly his own. Of course he’s familiar with it.

“Red,” Bucky repeats. It tastes heavy on his tongue, like copper, but right. A word he would want to say over and over again. “Red. That’s the first one I saw. That one is my favorite.”

Steve beamed up at him, his cheeks lighting up the color of blood. Red. Bucky couldn’t contain himself. He leaned over and pressed his lips against Steve’s. It lasted less than a second, barely even a brush of skin against skin, because Steve started coughing again.

They smiled at each other. Steve scooted over on the bed and lifted the blanket. He didn’t use words, but Bucky understood the question. He climbed in next to Steve, their noses just inches apart, their legs pressed together.

“Get some sleep, punk,” Bucky said, and placed a gentle kiss on Steve’s forehead.

“Not tired,” Steve said. His eyes were half-lidded, looking on the verge of sleep or death. Bucky didn’t want to think about that, about Steve dying. This wasn’t the first time Steve got sick and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. His body was kind of frail, but Steve had always been one hell of a fighter.


	2. Part Two; Sarah

Needless to say, Steve didn’t die that night. Or in the nights, or years, to come. Though sometimes it seemed close.

The worst came when Steve was seventeen.

When Sarah Rogers got sick, everyone figured it would pass. The Rogers’ were always catching everything, like magnets for every illness that came through. But as the months wore on, Steve’s mother didn’t get better. Instead, Bucky watched as she withered away to nothing. Steve said she passed quietly in her sleep, but Bucky hated to imagine it that way. Like it was that simple to die.

Sarah Rogers was just like her son-- small and outspoken and full of heart. He hated himself for it, but that was the scariest part for Bucky; if it was that easy for Sarah to die, then it was easy for Steve to die, too.

Steve pulled away after his mother’s death. Bucky tried to give him space, to let him grieve, but it was hard for him. Since they were kids, Bucky was able to protect Steve. But this… this was the one thing he couldn’t save him from.

After the funeral, Bucky followed Steve back to his empty apartment. For days, thoughts had been evading his head. Thoughts of Steve all alone in the apartment where his mother died. Thoughts of Steve wallowing, blaming himself, mourning in isolation. As he watched Steve rummage through his pockets, he said, “I was gonna ask--”

“I know what you’re gonna say, Buck.” Steve said, and Bucky couldn’t help the small smile that twisted his lips. Because of course Steve already knew. They’d talked about it before; different backgrounds, different arguments, different excuses, always with the same outcome. Bucky would never show Steve how much it hurt him because he kind of understood. Steve was so independent, always has been. Then again, Steve had never been this alone before.

In the years since their first kiss, there had been more. Brushes of lips in total darkness, hands held tight when no one could see. It was always there, unspoken. And Bucky knew why-- same-sex Matches aren’t totally uncommon, but they were whispered about in secret, treated like shameful things, even the platonic bonds.

Steve and Bucky had never defined exactly what they were. They were best friends, who happened to sometimes kiss. It occurred to Bucky that maybe that was the problem. They never talked about it. Now, more than anything, Bucky could feel that protective swell of emotion, that warmth that Steve always made him feel.

He kicked over the rock, unmasking the spare key, and handed it over. Their fingers brushed and neither pulled away. Did Steve feel the same knot in his stomach that Bucky did? Did he feel the static that made Bucky’s hair stand on end? The burn where their skin touched? Bucky wanted to say something, anything, he wanted to kiss Steve, to hold him close and never let go.

And if Steve didn’t feel those things? Bucky couldn’t bear to think of that. Steve was his best friend, and if that’s all Steve wanted then dammit Bucky would be the best damn friend there was. “We’ll put the couch cushions on the floor, like when we were kids. It’ll be fun.”

The muscle in Steve’s jaw jerked, tightening quickly just enough for Bucky to think he might have imagined it. “Thank you, Buck,” Steve said. “But I can get by on my own.”

Bucky swallowed past the lump in his throat. “The thing is, you don’t have to.” As if by pure gravitational pull, Bucky found himself stepping closer. His mouth was dry. “I love you, Steve.” His words sounded rough, gravel rolling off his tongue, yet it seemed to be the easiest words he’d ever spoken. So he said it again. “I love you.”

Steve blinked at him. His brow was furrowed, like he was solving a problem instead of staring at Bucky. Bucky laughed softly. “I’m kind of pouring my heart out here. You should say something.”

Steve’s lips curled when he laughed, and they remained quirked in a smile when he said, “I love you, too.”

Bucky nodded, like those words solved everything. And maybe they kind of did. They still had some things to talk about, but nothing that seemed very pressing right at that moment. Except one thing.

“Will you move in with me? Please?”


	3. Part Three; Together

The following week, Steve moved all of his belongings into Bucky’s small apartment. His dad gladly helped Bucky maneuver Steve’s metal bed frame up the stairs, while his mom helped Steve sort through things in the house-- boxes to go to Bucky’s, and boxes to donate.

When all was said and done, Bucky watched Steve take it all in. He ran his finger across a framed photo of his mom, settled neatly next to a photo of Bucky’s parents. Seeing them side by side, it really seemed to hit them both; this wasn’t just Bucky’s apartment anymore. It was Steve and Bucky’s. Theirs, together.

The first night, at just past one in the morning, Bucky felt his mattress dip. It was a sensation he could place immediately, but his half-asleep mind couldn’t quite understand why. Was his bed broken? And then a warmth settled over Bucky’s chest, pressed into his back, and he realized that someone had climbed into bed with him. Sleepy panic took hold of him and he twisted around to see who the hell broke into his apartment. But just before he saw who it was, he remembered; this wasn’t just his anymore. Sure enough, Steve was inches away, simply blinking back at him. In the dark, Bucky could barely make out anything but the shadows melting around Steve’s face. He was painfully aware of the arm still draped over his body.

“I couldn’t sleep,” Steve said. His voice was no more than a whisper, just warm air on Bucky’s cheeks. “I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

Bucky shook his head. “It’s okay. Is there anything I can do?”

“Just this.” His fingers tightened in Bucky’s sleep shirt, seeming afraid to let go.

Bucky inched closer. Their noses bumped together and Bucky tilted his head to properly kiss him. “What about this?” he asked against Steve’s lips.

He could feel Steve smile. It’s the best feeling in the word, he decided, to be able to feel that smile like it was his own. But too soon, the smile faded and Steve pulled back. Bucky could just make out the frown.

“Did I do something wrong?” Bucky asked.

He hoped Steve would just shake his head no, so they could go back to kissing, but Steve just frowned some more. “What is this, Buck? What are we doing?”

Bucky’s first instinct was to make a smartass remark about kissing, but he swallowed it down because he knew exactly what Steve was asking. This talk, the conversation they’d never had. Somehow it seemed easier to say things in the dark.

“I don’t know,” Bucky said, because it was the truth and he would never lie to Steve.

“We’re a Match.”

The words shouldn’t shock Bucky, it’s something he’d known since he was eight and saw that bloody little kid in the alley, and yet it’s jarring to hear it spoken aloud. He realized they’ve never acknowledged the bond this directly before. They had talked about the colors once, but never what the colors actually meant for them. Apparently Steve is set on changing all of that tonight, to say everything Bucky was never brave enough to say. Then again, Steve was always the braver of the two.

“It was that fight, when I was eight,” Steve said, “and you came to my rescue. That’s the first time I saw the color. I knew you were my Match.”

Bucky tried to form words, but failed. He could barely breathe, let alone speak. He just nodded.

Steve was quiet for a minute. It was a painful silence, one that Bucky wanted to fill with every emotion, every feeling, every word he’d never said.

“It can be platonic,” Steve finally said. “There are plenty of same-sex platonic Matches. You’re my best friend and--”

“No.” Bucky heard the word before he even realized he was saying it. But he meant it, with every fiber of his being, he meant it. “No, Steve, when I told you I loved you… I meant it. But I mean, I’m in love with you.”

“Oh.”

Bucky closed his eyes, rested his forehead against Steve’s, and simply basked in the closeness of him. He prepared to hear the rejection he’d been waiting his entire life for. He waited for Steve to say that it wasn’t mutual, that, while he loved Bucky, it wasn’t like that.

Steve brushed his fingertips over Bucky’s jaw, his cheek, his lips, and said, “You know, I’m in love with you, too.”

“So…” Bucky licked his lips, tasting Steve on them. “Not platonic then?”

Steve chuckled. “Definitely not platonic.”

The words resounded in Bucky’s head, bouncing around like his heart in his chest. “Okay,” he said, and Steve laughed.

“We should get some sleep.”

And while Bucky agreed, he didn’t feel like sleeping at that moment. He felt like he was flying and if he fell asleep now, he was afraid he would wake to find it had only been a dream. So instead, he pressed forward to kiss Steve again and prayed the night would never end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy the fluff while it lasts, the next chapter is when it starts getting angsty :)


	4. Part Four; War

Bucky cried when he got the draft order.

When he told his parents and sisters he had enlisted, he held his head high and readily pronounced that he was prepared to serve his country with pride.

But when he and Steve were alone, he felt an obligation to be honest.

And honestly, he was scared as hell.

“I don’t want to go,” he would tell Steve during late nights when they were curled in bed together. Steve would rub his hands over Bucky’s spine and though he never cried with him, Bucky knew that Steve was just as scared as he was.

“We could run,” Bucky mused. “We could leave the state, maybe the country.”

But Steve, ever the realist, said, “You’d go to prison.”

“Only if we got caught.”

“They could send me,” Steve said, and at the time Bucky had laughed. He found the mere idea of Steve, scrawny and asthmatic, training to ship overseas both hilarious and unnerving. He thought it was a joke.

Until Steve actually tried to enlist. Not just once, but over and over again when each time they turned him away.

“You’re from Paramus now?” Bucky asked, sneering at yet another denied enlistment form. “What the hell are you thinking, Steve?”

“That I can do this,” Steve said.

“You’re gonna get yourself arrested.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “That didn’t seem to bother you when you suggested we go on the run for draft evasion.”

“That was a pipedream!” Bucky yelled. “That was wishful thinking! If you haven’t noticed, I didn’t go through with it! I’m shipping out in two days!”

Steve blinked at him through a veil of tears and said, “Yeah, Buck. I noticed.”

As he looked at Steve, Bucky’s anger seemed to deflate. He saw for the first time that Steve wasn’t just scared; he was angry, too. “You’re not a soldier, Steve.”

“Because they won’t let me be one,” Steve said. “I could do it if they let me.”

“I know that,” Bucky admitted, and it was total honesty. He had always known Steve was strong. The strongest person he knew, and what he didn’t have in strength he made up for in stubbornness. “You’re safer here, Steve. Please, just promise me you will stay here. Stay safe.”

“Can you promise that, Bucky?” Steve asked. “Can you promise me that you’ll stay safe?”

No, Bucky knew. But he couldn’t form the word, couldn’t admit that there was no way he could promise that no matter how much he wanted to.

Steve seemed to see this because he just nodded. He’d proven his point though Bucky hated to admit it.

Just before he left, Bucky hugged Steve probably too tight. Steve didn’t mind, as he held on just as tightly. “Don’t do anything stupid until I get back,” he said.

“How could I?” Steve retorted. “You’re taking all the stupid with you.”

Bucky pulled back. He wanted to kiss Steve. He wanted to remember, for however long he was gone, what Steve tasted like. But there were other families here, people who wouldn’t take too kindly to seeing the affection between them. So Bucky settled for nudging his foot against Steve’s and whispering, “I love you.”

The smile Steve offered didn’t reach his eyes; it hardly even reached his lips. “This isn’t goodbye,” he said. “You’ll be back.”

Bucky nodded. Out loud, he agreed. Inside, he wasn’t so sure.


	5. Part Five; Strong

Of course, because Steve was incapable of leaving things alone, the first thing he did when Bucky shipped out was something stupid.

The whole time, he could hear Bucky’s voice in his head telling him what a stupid idea it was, exasperated and chiding. But louder than that was the need inside of him, the urgency, to do something that mattered.

He thought of Bucky tromping across marshes and hunched in ravines, gun slung over his shoulder. He was berated by the image of Bucky in a shower of bullets and bombs.

What was really stupid was asking Steve to stay here, to cower, while Bucky was shipped away and forced into a war he wanted no part in.

He wondered how often Bucky thought of him; he liked to imagine quite often, but he knew the pressures of war didn’t leave much room for pleasantries.

All throughout basic training, Steve could hear Bucky’s voice; when his asthma started acting up, he could hear Bucky telling him to take it easy. As he fell behind the others during a simple run, he could hear Buck saying, “ _ I told you so. _ ” And when Steve lay awake at night, surrounded by soldiers who didn’t care to know him, he could hear Bucky whispering,  _ “We could run away.” _

He spent long nights wondering what that would have looked like, if they had really left all of this behind. The whole damn world seemed to be in the middle of the war by that point and he knew that nowhere was really safe, but Bucky had been right; it was nice to dream.

They could have found a place, some magical, mystical new world where same-sex matches were accepted. A place where they didn’t have to hide shared kisses in shadowed corners. A place where they could hold hands and profess their love proudly.

And maybe, just maybe, a place like that did exist out there. But war certainly wasn’t it.

A lot of things changed at once for Steve as he was thrust upon the world as the brave new icon Captain America. Overnight, he became a sensation. He was big and strong and everything he always felt inside, but now the outside matched. People would look at him and gape; some were awed, some fearful, and some were a strange mixture of both.

It was the safest he could be, as he’d promised Bucky, but there was a longing in him to do more. He was the face of a movement, but he had never felt so hollow. He danced, he sang, he sold bonds and shook hands of the right people, and more than anything he thought of Bucky.

He’d hate this new look, Steve often told himself, especially the outfit. But it was his duty, the only one he had. This was the best thing he could do now.

So if singing and prancing around onstage was what Steve was meant to do, then by god he would do it.

Bucky always told Steve how strong he was. He liked to remind Steve that he was the strongest person he knew. And yet here, now, he felt useless. He was a puppet on a string, tugged in directions he had no control over.

His body was everything he ever needed it to be, but never in his life had he felt weaker.

And then they told him that Sergeant James Barnes was dead.

Instinctively, Steve knew this was wrong. 

When they were taught about the colors, they were told as fairy tale musings. They were a gift, a mystical and magical thing that arrived because of one’s soulmate. And just like in fairy tales, gifts usually came at the cost of a curse. In this case, the curse was when one of the Matches died; just as quickly as the color had come, it would be stripped away. Gone forever.

As Steve watched Phillips stoically signing death letters to families back home, we saw the flash of gold on the man’s ring finger. He saw the brown grain of the table and the green strands of the grass.

And as innately as he knew he loved Bucky, Steve knew that his soulmate was not dead.

He repeated the reassurance to himself until the words lost meaning and became nothing more than jumbled sounds in his head.

Bucky was not dead. He couldn’t be dead. It wasn’t possible. Bucky was not dead…

And yet there was that feeling in his stomach that twisted and turned and asked, What if?

What if it was a fluke? What if the serum that made him strong also made the color permanent?

It wasn’t until he found him, strapped to the lab table, muttering his own name and identification number, that Steve truly let himself believe it. Bucky was not dead. The relief that flooded his body was palpable.

“Buck?” He jostled Bucky, who blinked blearily and inclined his head to meet Steve’s eyes.

“Steve?” A smile spread across his face and his fingertips fluttered at his side. He said his name like it was made of air.  _ “Steve.” _

“I thought you were dead,” Steve admitted, like a deep dark secret he needed to divulge before it ate him alive.

Bucky couldn’t do much more than stare, hands gripping Steve’s biceps. “I thought you were smaller.” He swayed, unsteady on his feet.

A laugh lodged itself in Steve’s throat. “We have to go.”

“Yeah,” Bucky agreed. His hand trailed from Steve’s arm to his shoulder, skimming across the skin of Steve’s neck, and stopped just short of his jaw. “Are you real?” 

With a sigh, Steve leaned into the touch. It felt like home in a way that he hadn’t felt since Bucky left for war all those months ago. “I’m real, Bucky. I’m here.”

Bucky nodded. He stepped closer to press a soft kiss to Steve’s lips. It lasted only a moment but a thousand feelings passed between them. When they parted, Bucky was smiling. His eyes-- so blue, bluer than Steve remembered and he cursed himself for ever thinking they were duller-- looked clear.

“Told you not to do anything stupid,” he said.

“Yeah,” Steve snorted, “and I told you to stay safe. Looks like we’re even.” He grabbed hold of Bucky’s hand, lacing their fingers together. “We have to get out of here.”

Dragging Bucky along with him, they made their escape. They didn’t have a chance to really talk as they found the other survivors and started the long trek back to base, but Steve was in no hurry to explain. He was just happy to have Bucky back, to be here, to feel strong and useful and like himself again.

And when he lost Bucky again a few months later, watching helplessly as he fell from the train, Steve drew all of that strength inside himself to finish the mission and do what he had to do.

It wasn’t until he got back to base with the others, recounting to Phillips how Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes hadn’t survived, that he realized what was wrong.

All around him, just like the day he met Bucky and every day after, there was color.


	6. Part Six; Peggy

When Peggy found him, Steve was in a bombed out pub pouring over a map. The clutter of old chairs and ruined tables had been pushed out of the way, creating a clearing for Steve to work. An empty bottle sat nearby and the smell of whiskey permeated the room, mingling with the dust and making her nose itch.

She couldn’t see until she stepped closer just what the map held and when she did, she sighed.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Steve said, and though she had been the one to sneak up on him, Peggy startled at the sound of his voice. It was rough as if he’d been crying, but he sounded totally sober. An effect of the serum, she presumed.

“Captain Rogers,” she said. Stepping closer, Peggy saw the lines marking certain parts of the map, circles crudely marked here and there and Xs elsewhere. Her heart ached for him and she wanted to reach out, to comfort him, but she wasn’t quite sure how. “Steve.”

“Peggy,” Steve said, his voice a plea all on its own. “Please, just don’t.”

When she had first met Steve, she knew there was something special about him. Perhaps it was the strength she could sense hiding in his small body, or the compassion he wore like a button on his sleeve. There was an earnestness about him that captivated her, drew her in and made her want to know more. In total honesty, she wasn’t surprised to find him here and she was even less surprised to find what he was doing.

That’s why it killed her inside to step forward, placing a hand on the map, forcing him to look at her. “Steve, I’m sorry. I know this is hard on you. I know that you and Sergeant Barnes were close--”

“He’s not dead,” Steve said. He looked back down to the map. “Can you please move your hand?”

Peggy took her hand off the paper, opting to fold her arms across her chest. She studied the map in front of them. He’d made a point of eliminating the areas too far out of range for Bucky to have landed and there were circles in a few areas that he had deemed most likely.

“You saw him fall,” Peggy said. She felt as though she was talking to a child, trying to explain to them in a way they could understand that their friend was dead. And as much as she knew it was necessary to make Steve understand, she also hated herself for it; why did she have to ruin this for him? Why couldn’t she just let him have this delusion, let him believe his best friend was still alive out there? But she knew in order for him to move on, he had to accept this.

Bucky was not coming back.

“No one could have survived that fall,” Peggy continued. She moved to rest her hand on his shoulder, but he shrugged it off and kept his eyes down.

“What if Zola had been experimenting on him?” Steve asked suddenly. A fierceness swelled in his voice that Peggy hadn’t recognized before; an urgency more than desperation. “He was trying to recreate the super soldier serum, what if Bucky was his lab rat?”

Peggy considered this. “So you want to use our resources leading your men on a dangerous mission to try to retrieve him? Because you think he’s still alive?”

“He is alive,” Steve said, “and I won’t take any men or resources. I’ll go by myself if I have to.”

“Steve!” Slapping a hand down on the table, Peggy felt as though she had well and truly had enough of this. He was acting crazy and if nice wasn’t going to help him, then she would play the role of  _ Agent Carter _ to make him see the truth. “Are you even listening to yourself? This is a suicide mission.”

For a moment, as Steve looked up at her with glossy eyes, she thought she had finally gotten through to him. But he simply released an unsteady breath and said, “I know it’s dangerous. I know it sounds crazy. But I also know that Bucky is still alive out there.”

Peggy shook her head sadly. “How could you possibly know that, Steve?”

For the first time since she’d met him, Steve looked uncertain. His gaze dropped back to the map and he fiddled with the pen in his hands before he looked up at her again. His voice fell to a whisper and he said, “Because if Bucky was dead, the color would be gone.”

It took a moment, then two, for Peggy to process what he was saying. And when she did, it all made so much sense. “Sergeant Barnes is your Match.”

Steve looked back to the map. He didn’t confirm her words, but instead reiterated, “I have to find him.”

Turning back, Peggy let her attention really fall on the map. She genuinely looked at it, trying to understand what the markings meant and if he’d narrowed down a certain area. “It’s too much,” she finally said, gesturing to the places he had circled. “There’s no way we can cover this much area alone. If we go to Phillips and ask for a few men, tell him that you’re certain Sergeant Barnes is still alive--”

“No,” Steve interjected. He shook his head for good measure. “No. You can’t tell anyone about this. If anyone finds out--” he trailed off and she could only imagine the things soaring through his head. The penalties, the consequences for both Steve and Bucky if word of their Match got out. “No,” he said again.

“Sam-sex platonic bonds aren’t going to get you tossed out of the army, Steve,” she said.

For a brief moment, the uncertainty from before was back and she could see the words play across his features, knew exactly what he was going to say, before they even left his mouth. “And what if it’s not platonic?”

Peggy sighed. “We’re in this alone then, aren’t we?” She stuck out her hand. The map looked massive in a way it hadn’t before when she said, “Pen?” and started to get to work.


	7. Part Seven; Cold

Steve had made a lot of mistakes in his life. He was a man with a conscience, and on that conscience weighed a lot; he was only human after all. But he did the best with what he had been given. Sometimes he was arrogant and stubborn, but he tried hard to be kind and compassionate. He was raised to be a good boy and, long after his mother died, he could confidently say he believed himself to be a good man. 

In the aircraft carrying the deadliest arsenal known to man, Steve weighed these mistakes versus the man he had come to be.

Clouds stretched out before him, colorless shapes spattered against an endless blue sky. It felt poetic, and for a moment he allowed himself to take it all in. Just him and the sky. And then he connected the comms, hoping against hope that someone would be there to answer.

Both a blessing and a curse, Peggy was the one to respond.

“Schmidt is dead,” he told her.

“And the plane?” Peggy asked. “Tell me your coordinates, I’ll find you a safe landing site.”

Steve shook his head, aware that she couldn’t see him. For that, he was grateful. He wasn’t sure he could make his next decision if she had been looking at him. He said, “There won’t be a safe landing.”

There was a pause, a heartbeat of silence that carried his words and their meaning across the vast miles between them.

“No, Steve.” He could hear the plea in her voice. “I can get Howard on the line. He’ll know what to do.”

“Peggy, there’s not enough time.”

Time, he mused. That was always the problem, wasn’t it? If only they had more time. Steve’s mind wandered to Bucky, as it had a way of doing, and he wondered what Bucky would say to him now.

 _Don’t do anything stupid_ , he would say, _not without me._

But this wasn’t so stupid, was it? It was selfless.

And selfish, he thought bitterly, and cursed Bucky for not being here in the first place.

“This thing is heading for New York,” Steve said. “I gotta put her in the water.”

He heard a crackle over the comm, a sound like a sniffle. “Please don’t do this,” Peggy said, but her voice was futile. She knew he’d already made up his mind.

“Right now I’m in the middle of nowhere,” Steve reasoned. “If I wait any longer, a lot of people are gonna die. This is my choice.”

Gripping the controls tighter, he angled the aircraft down.

The shapes of the clouds began to change around him before fading away completely. Before him, Steve saw the ocean.

“His eyes are blue,” Steve said. He could hear a sound, tinny and small through the speaker, and he was fairly certain Peggy was crying. It was selfish, he thought, forcing her to listen to him die, but he was glad he wasn’t alone. “Bucky’s eyes, they’re blue. Just like the water. I think that’s a pretty good way to go, don’t you?” He laughed. His own tears began to cloud his vision and he blinked them away.

“Peggy?” he asked.

A moment of silence fell over him and he prayed that she hadn’t disconnected. But her voice answered, “I’m here.”

“Promise me,” Steve said. The frozen water looked like glass. It glittered blue and silver under the sunlight. As much as he wanted to close his eyes, he stared forward. He would die seeing blue, rather than the empty blackness behind his eyelids. “Promise me you’ll find him. Don’t give up on him.”

A pause, heavy with breaths they shared through the comms, and then she said, “I won’t. I promise.”

Steve allowed himself to smile. He braced for the impact, ready to once again be lost in the sea of Bucky’s eyes. “When you find Bucky,” he said, “tell him I love h--”

The communication cut off. Silence so loud it seemed deafening.

There was only the sound of dead air and Peggy Carter crying. Nothing more.


	8. Part Eight; Awake

When he awoke to a bright room-- a bright world-- nearly seventy years later, Steve was forced to face the harshest of realities.

Not the mind boggling idea that he was indeed in the future, nor that the war was over and everyone he once knew was gone.

No, the hardest part was accepting the fact that Bucky really was dead.

For a brief moment upon waking up, the color had been the only comfort. It was familiar in a world that had seemingly changed overnight. As he stood in the center of Time Square, futuristic cars speeding around him, moving pictures lighting up the billboards, it was all so overwhelming. He’d been in the ice for almost seventy years.

That was when Steve realized that the color wasn’t a gift, but a curse; A reminder of the life he had, once upon a time. A painful memory that haunted his waking hours.

It would hit him at random times, and all over again the grief would consume him. The reminder that, while Bucky was gone, the color remained.

In this new world, with these new friends, the only person he told about the color was Natasha. He knew, not so deep down, that the others wouldn’t judge him but old habits die hard, and telling Natasha hadn’t been entirely voluntary anyway. It started with an accident.

They were drawing up reports of their most recent escapades when Steve gestured to the table and asked, “Can you hand me the red pen?”

When Natasha didn’t reply, he looked up. She was just staring at him. Confused, Steve added, “Please?”

But she just shook her head and looked helplessly down at the pens. “I don’t know what red is.”

As he ran the words back through his head, he realized that yes, he had said red. And no, Natasha didn’t understand the color.

He blinked rapidly against the sudden rush of tears in his eyes. “Oh,” he said, “sorry.” Reaching past her, he grabbed the pen, but strangely enough he had forgotten what it was he wanted to write. Instead, he just stared at the pen.

He could feel Natasha’s gaze on him, but she said nothing. And maybe it was because of that silence, that quiet offer to let it go, that Steve found himself talking. “I thought the color would be gone, you know? They say the color goes away when your Match dies. I think it’s easier that way.” Steve shrugged, uncapping the pen. He drew a line on the back of his hand. _Red_. “It’s probably because of the serum, the same way I can’t get drunk or I’m stronger. I’m forever stuck in color.”

He couldn’t bring himself to look at Natasha, his entire focus on the red line on his skin. He knew, given the opportunity, most people would do anything to see color. And he did. Every day, Steve woke up to see the putrid green walls in his apartment, the yellow of the taxis, the blue of the sky-- and every day, he hated it all just a little bit more.

“What was her name?” Natasha asked.

Steve’s smile turned wry. “James,” he said, “but everyone called him Bucky.”

It was an unspoken agreement that Natasha wouldn’t tell anyone. He didn’t have to ask and she didn’t offer, but it became a secret between the two of them. Maybe one day he would be ready to tell the others. Maybe one day he could talk about Bucky and it wouldn’t hurt so damn much.

One day, he promised himself.

Only one day never really came. Months passed and Steve tried to grieve. He visited the Smithsonian, the only memorial for Bucky that he had, but it felt wrong. The words on the wall depicted Bucky as his childhood friend, his comrade, but it didn’t do Steve’s feelings justice. He wondered what the memorial would say if they had been open about their bond back then, but the thought was fleeting; if they had been open back then, he doubted there would even be a memorial to look at today. They would have buried Captain America’s gay lover themselves.

It left a bitter taste in his mouth.

How would people react now, if they knew? Times had changed, but nothing was perfect.

A long time ago, he and Bucky had mused of a place where they could be themselves. Totally and completely. Two men in love. But Steve laughed resentfully at the thought; they hadn’t needed to run away to a place, but to a time.

Now, he thinks, if Bucky were still here, he would have the courage to be honest. He would stand on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and scream that Bucky Barnes was his soulmate. 

But Bucky wasn’t here. And as strong as he was, Steve didn’t think he was strong enough to do it without him.


	9. Part Nine; Red

He didn’t have a name. Names were for people and he was a machine.

He’s sure he must have had a name at some point, but it had been erased with everything else. It didn’t matter anyway, not anymore.

They call him a soldier, and that is enough.

His mind was a sheet of paper; scribbled on and shredded and taped back together in various ways. And his body? It felt enough like his own, but he couldn’t recall what being himself felt like. He knew enough to know the arm, shiny and metallic, was not of his own making. But his actions aren’t his own either.

For as long as he could remember, they had controlled him. They broke him down to his bare essentials and remodeled him as they saw fit, only to trash him and begin again.

He was a puppet tied to strings and he couldn’t see who held the other end.

The faces around him changed often. Each time he awoke, it was a different person giving him orders. Through bits and pieces of eavesdropped conversation, he assumed they must have been freezing him somehow. The science and logic didn’t make sense to him, but then again it didn’t have to.

He was a soldier and soldiers didn’t ask questions; they followed orders.

Cryogenic sleep was not like other sleep, he was sure. He couldn’t explain it in words, even in his own head, but it was something he felt. He didn’t remember enough of normal sleep to delineate the difference. It just was.

Sometimes when he was asleep, he could feel time passing. Days, months, years, all spinning by outside of his cage. He couldn’t watch it, but there was a sense of some sort.

It was during those times that he dreamed.

In these dreams, he saw a shadow made of light. It was a person. An angel. Colors he couldn’t recall the names of circled the stranger’s head like a halo, clothes woven from stars and blood clung to their lithe frame.

He didn’t know who the shadowed person was. Sometimes he awoke with a word on the tip of his tongue only for it to fall away before it reached air. Many times he thought it was just an illusion, a guardian angel sent to make everything feel just a little less bad.

He didn’t deserve an angel, he thought. They messed with his head, made him forget the things they had him do, but he remembered a lot, too.

He remembers the screams of people he’s been sent to eliminate.

The scent of gunpowder fresh in his nostrils.

He remembers blood. So much blood.

He must have been a bad person before all of this became him.

Maybe this is what he deserved.

Missions were both the bane of his existence and his only purpose. He wished sometimes that they would just kill him, but he knew he was far too useful to them to be disposed of so easily. The idea of botching missions on purpose occurred to him more than once, but he didn’t have the courage and he hated that about himself. Not that the thought ever lasted long enough to come to fruition; they always wiped his memory before it came to that point.

His target this time was a man they referred to only as Fury. He was to take him out no matter the casualties. It was supposed to be simple.

Until someone got in the way.

The soldier was no stranger to people fighting back; he was an assassin and his targets usually weren’t ones that would go quietly. But never in his many years had he come across someone who matched his strength.

The man with the shield was different.

The dark of night cloaked them both in shadows but the man didn’t seem hindered in the least. His speed matched the soldier’s, his agility, his determination. It was the first time in so long that he felt a thrill. He felt alive.

He felt human.

When the man threw his shield, the soldier caught it with grace and ease. There, painted across the top, he saw a star glimmer in the moonlight. The colors he couldn’t name. And that word-- the one he’d dreamt of for so long finally planted itself firmly in his head.

_ Red _ .

He shook his head. It didn’t mean anything. It was a word, maybe from his past, maybe conjured up by his dreams. It didn’t matter.

He hurled the shield back and disappeared into the night.

But though he tried, he couldn’t shake the feeling. That word. It meant something.

Later, as they prepared to put him back to sleep, he asked, “What does red mean?”

The scientists and soldiers bustling about around him froze.

It wasn't the first time he’d spoken, but most of his words were intelligence. He conveyed mission reports and detailed his assignment proceedings. But as he addressed the room as a whole with the casual query, everyone around him stopped.

He waited.

A few of the soldiers looked to each other with uncertainty. One tightened his grip on his gun, as if the question itself was a threat. Someone laughed, a half of a sound that reverberated against the walls. All eyes turned to a scientist who seemed to look curious and amused. “It’s a color,” the scientist said. He looked to his comrades. “Son of a bitch can see color.”

The realization seemed to dawn over the room as a whole and another one of the soldiers laughed. “You mean to tell me our Winter Soldier here has a soulmate?”

Soulmate.

The word bounced around in his head and he tried to grasp its meaning. Distantly, he thought he could recall something about soulmates, but no matter how hard he stretched, it was just beyond his reach.

The next time he saw the man with the shield was on the bridge. As per his instructions, the soldier knew this time that this stranger was his target. They called him the Captain. Nothing more.

He wondered if this Captain was like himself; a machine not worthy of a name.

They fought alike, both soldiers in their own right. It was a dance between adversaries, a masquerade of malice, and the thrill of it left the soldier feeling things he thought for so long he was incapable of. He longed for more. Maybe they had fought like this before, long ago. Or maybe they’d been side by side instead.

The thoughts flitted through his mind, musings like daydreams, as they fought.

The Captain could win, he thought, and that would be okay. He would fight until his dying breath and then when the Captain defeated him, it would be justice. That would be an adequate way to die.

When his mask slipped from his face and he turned to the Captain, he prepared for the final blows. He readied himself for whatever would come next. Maybe death was like his frozen sleep. That wouldn't be so bad.

Only, as he waited, the final blows never came. Instead, the Captain had stopped. His hands fell open at his sides.

Stood against the backdrop of the glistening sunlight, he looked just like the angel from the soldier’s dreams.

The Captain said, “Bucky?”

And with that simple word, so familiar and foreign, the soldier felt something unravel inside him.

The word from before pelted him on all sides and he flinched from the sudden wave of it. The word he’d been dreaming of. The color.

_ RedRedRedRedRedRedRed _

It numbed his body and flooded his mind.

He thought of blood.

The memory of cleaning up bloodied knuckles, kissing bruised lips, and scraped palms.

_ Red _ .

_ I’m Bucky _ , he thought.

Not a machine, not a soldier, but a person with a name.

Bucky.

And all at once, he remembered. He could see this man in front of him so clearly, curled up on an old green couch with a book in his hands. He could see him nestled in gray sheets, his lips and cheeks flushed pink.

Red was more than a color. It was more than the blood. It was this man.

It was his soulmate.

He swayed on his feet and it took every ounce of strength he had to stay standing as he found sharp blue eyes-- eyes he can’t believe he ever managed to forget. So many words clawed at his throat in a desperate attempt to escape, but he swallowed them down. All except for one, which swept past his lips, ripping his soul from his chest and lying it bare between them.

_ “Steve?” _

**_The end_ **


End file.
